


The Best Game, Aside From Badminton, Of Course

by an_atlas_of_clouds



Category: Captain America - All Media Types, Marvel (Movies), Marvel Cinematic Universe
Genre: M/M, Oneshot, Spin the Bottle, outrageouslydrunk!bucky, preserum!Steve
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-08-25
Updated: 2014-08-25
Packaged: 2018-02-14 15:46:20
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,288
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/2197518
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/an_atlas_of_clouds/pseuds/an_atlas_of_clouds
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Bucky had this remarkable plan, see. He was determined to have Steve get his first kiss, tonight if possible. Absolutely brilliant, dare I say, foolproof, he’d said to Steve and his date, several times.</p>
            </blockquote>





	The Best Game, Aside From Badminton, Of Course

**Author's Note:**

> The idea I attribute entirely to this post http://imaginebucky.tumblr.com/post/87276768593/imagine-bucky-with-preserum-steve-thinking-hes-smooth , just a drabble I wanted to flesh out a little.

[1939]

The five of them were crowded near one of the two windows in Bucky and Steve’s apartment, the one overlooking the street. Every once in a while a cool breeze floated up, followed by sighs of temporary relief, but the most activity outside was from a drunken couple singing the chorus from _Stormy Water_ for the third, fourth, fifth time.

The two young men sat shoulder-to-shoulder with their backs to the window, slick with sweat; the two dames Bucky had wrangled to another science expo were fanning themselves with the wrinkled pamphlets, and their older friend sat between them, undoing the top three buttons of her blouse. They’d met up with her after she’d sung her numbers at the bar, and Bucky managed to charm her into accompanying them back to the apartment.

“Always good to have a backup,” Bucky had said into his ear as Steve was fumbling to get the key in the lock, before turning back to his audience and continuing with his story about his near-death experience last week (he’d stepped into the street without looking and nearly got flattened by the milkman).

Bucky had this remarkable plan, see.  He was determined to have Steve get his first kiss, tonight if possible.  Absolutely brilliant, dare I say, foolproof, he’d said to Steve and his date, several times.

*

Half an hour and dozens of meandering half-conversations later, whiskey and beer bottles litter the floor, most of them gravitating towards Bucky’s feet, who’s getting pretty close to shit-hammered wasted. Everyone’s breathing booze.  The girls are tipsy and giggling, and Steve’s eyes are starting to droop as he empties his second bottle.

Suddenly, an intoxicated Bucky is seized by his second award-winning idea; he plucks the half-empty beer from Steve’s unsteady hand, quickly drains it, and places the bottle in the middle of the lopsided circle. “Let’s play my favorite game, aside from badminton, of course.  American Classic. God _damn_ I love badminton.”

Patty perks up. “You know there’s an International Badminton Federation?”

He stops and grins at her. “Established five years ago, can you believe it?” With his forefinger and thumb, Bucky grasps the neck of the bottle and sends it into a spin.  He leans back against the windowsill with satisfaction, glancing to his right and meeting Steve’s eyes.  Steve gives a small smile and shakes his head with his usual motherly air of disapproval, and Bucky sends him a lazy wink in return.  He still believes his original plan is foolproof, but it never hurts to speed things up a little.

*

But somehow the damn bottle just won’t land on Steve; always stopping too short or skipping right by him.

Bucky’s fourth spin is Louisa, and she surges forward to bite into his lip hard enough that he’s certain he’ll wake up tomorrow morning with a bruise (or more, if he’s lucky). He slides his tongue between her teeth and out of the corner of his eye he sees Steve cough and stare determinedly at the crack running along the ceiling, and he laughs into her blonde curls.  After she returns to her spot between the other two women, Bucky rolls the bottle over to Steve.

“God. _Damn_ it, Steve,” he slurs.  His Brooklyn accent was always painfully tangible when he was this far gone.  “If you don’t kiss a pretty dame tonight I will have failed you.”  He wipes his nose on his sleeve. “And when have I ever let you down?”

Two of the red-faced gals giggle, but the one on the far right, Marguerite (the backup), stares at Steve like a hawk ready to divebomb onto a meerkat.  Bucky decides he doesn’t like Marguerite. Instead of analyzing the reasoning behind this judgment, he shouts, “Spin it, Steve, c’mon!”

Steve glances up at the girls again and blushes, before doing as his friend says.  He reaches out and sends the bottle into a spin, and everyone watches in a sudden hush as it spins around and around and around and around until…it lands on Bucky.

He breaks the silence with a laugh, and waves away Steve’s deepening blush. “Spin it again.”

Steve obeys, trying it gently so it’d stop at Louisa, maybe even Patty (who was starting to nod off against the dresser), but it once again glides over to the man sitting on his left, the mouth of the bottle an open “O” of surprise.  Bucky feels as if it is mocking him.

Drunk out of his mind, and determined to follow through on his promise, Bucky shrugs and beckons Steve closer. “I guess you’ll just have to settle for me, Stevie.” Louisa laughs and nudges Patty awake, and the three girls scoot forward to get a better view.

“I want a proper kiss from my boys,” Louisa says raucously. “None’a that chaste stuff.”

Steve starts protesting, thus initiating one of their more amusing, and less productive, arguments, in which he realizes that debating a heavily inebriated Bucky on the semantics of spin-the-bottle is utterly useless.  It feels as if there’s no one else in the room, just the sound of the street life below and the radio buzzing away from the neighbor’s window.

“Buck, we really don’t have to do this, it ain’t that big of a deal –“

“Listen here, punk.” Bucky jabs a finger at Steve’s bony chest. “ _You_ spun the damn bottle, and if _you_ think _I’m_ gonna let _you_ back down, then you (another jab) are. Dead. Wrong.”

“Buck, I’d never try to kiss a dame while she’s drunk, and you’re no exception.”

“Better get to it, the audience is getting b—“

And just like that, Steve grabs Bucky’s face with both hands, his face scrunched with determination, and jams their faces together with careful precision. Bucky’s suddenly very much aware of Steve’s chapped lips and crooked nose and bony fingers cupping his face and his _thumb,_ that damn thumb, unconsciously rubbing a small circle under Bucky’s jaw.  They settle against each other, Steve’s lips now moving uncertainly, clumsily, against Bucky’s own.  Taking a leap, Bucky darts his tongue out against Steve’s lower lip, totally as a joke.  He feels Steve give off the slightest shudder in response.  It’s only a joke.

Not the best kiss Bucky’s ever had, but not the worst either.  It lasts only for a few seconds, and after they pull back he grins helplessly at Steve, whose eyebrows are challenging him to a drunken retort, I _dare_ you.

The girls start clapping and hollering and whistling, and Patty feigns a swoon in Louisa’s arms.  Steve’s blushing all the way to the tips of his ears, and hastily returns the space between him and Bucky.  The brief moment of sharp focus had gone all hazy again as soon as Steve’s thumb had stopped tracing the invisible circles.  Bucky's words stumble out.

“How was I, Stevie? Was it m-memorable?” He stammers.   _Shit._

“Nothin’ to write home about, Buck, don’t flatter yourself.” Steve says thickly, feigning indifference, but Bucky sees as he fists his hands in his pockets.

Bucky’s lips are still tingling from the kiss, and he’s so distracted by the taste of his friend’s saliva on his tongue that he barely notices as the girls set the bottle across the floor again.  Marguerite’s next spin lands her Steve, and she gives a victorious whoop as she launches across the circle and plants a very long, very thorough kiss on his mouth.

Bucky doesn’t say much for the rest of the night, especially when Steve spins, but he’s pretty sure no one notices.  He tries his best to ignore the bizarre feeling in his gut whenever one of the girls gets a piece of Steve. It was only a joke, after all.

 


End file.
